WASHINGTON, October 3. /TASS/. US President Donald Trump has not rejected the spirit of the meeting with Russian President Vladimir Putin in Anchorage and still hopes that relations between Washington and Moscow will improve, former vice-chair of the National Intelligence Council Graham Fuller has told TASS.
Commenting on the US side’s remarks about the possibility of Tomahawk cruise missile deliveries to Ukraine, and reports about Washington providing Kiev with information for strikes on Russia’s energy infrastructure, Fuller said: "I would not say that he has abandoned the Anchorage, the spirit of Anchorage, if you will. I think that probably is something that is fairly deep in his mind, even in his heart, as the kind of legacy he would like to leave behind as a great statesman who was able to, you know, accomplish rapprochement and settlement with Russia."
"I'm not ready to say, Oh, my God, it's all finished, Anchorage has been lost. I think Trump is quite capable of suddenly changing his mind, acting impulsively, and I could even imagine him picking up the phone to talk to Vladimir Putin at some point," he continued. "I'm far from being in the position of saying that it's all finished and it's heading irrevocably towards [world] war."
In his opinion, it is important to put the current developments around Ukraine "in broader context of the character and nature of Donald Trump."
"We all know that he's very volatile, changes his mind all the time, is not well informed on details, has no strategic vision," the former intelligence official said. "But I think he has some sort of <...> fingertip feel for situations and people, which helps him maneuver through some of these issues."
"At the same time I'm sure you've heard the expression that people say that Donald Trump's views reflect the last person who spoke to him, last person he talked to. I think there's probably some truth to that," Fuller continued.
The former US official is convinced that Trump "doesn't want to be the president who is accused of ‘losing Ukraine’." In his opinion, "there are a lot of other forces at work within his own party."
"They hate anything he wants to do, and that makes difficulties in creating policy," he added.